Three Goodbyes
by Resa Aureus
Summary: One meeting. Two children. Three Goodbyes. This is an epilogue-compliant one-shot about Hermione and Draco and their lives over the span of about twenty years.


A/N. Just in my head and I was irresponsibly ignoring an in-process chapter for ToT. I was a little Draco/Hermione starved,

...~oOo~...

"Please, Hermione, just listen," Draco said, sounding more desperate than he cared too. They were arguing in one of the more abandoned halls at the Ministry. It felt like whenever they were together it became an argument. "There's still hope -"

"HOPE, Draco?" Hermione whisper-screeched, the shrillness of her voice ringing off the walls. "You're MARRIED. To Astoria! What do you mean, bloody hope?"

"You don't have to marry Weasley," Draco said through gritted teeth. He hated that weasel-faced, red-headed menace. Always riding on Potter's coattails and seemingly always getting between him and Hermione.

"No, I don't," Hermione hissed. "But I want to! So I'm going to! I love him, Draco!"

"Not like you loved me -"

"No, you're right," Hermione said. "The way we felt about each other - it was insane. It was like throwing yourself in front of an Unforgivable."

"So what if it was risky! It was passionate and intense - and you were fucking happy!" Draco snapped. "Stupid Weasel is safe and secure and he's more like your bloody brother than a lover - and he still wins? I just don't get it!"

"Draco, our relationship after the war depended entirely on whether or not your father was put in Azkaban," Hermione said slowly, darkly. "We both knew it. But in the end, that was no way to start a relationship, even if he had been incarcerated. We were doomed from the start and you're only dragging up details that were put away a long time ago." She took a deep breath. "I don't blame you, Draco. You're a Malfoy and you had a responsibility not to dirty the bloodline by marrying a Mudblood. You married Astoria, I'm marrying Ron - the end. I refuse to be your dirty little secret."

Hermione turned to walk away and leave it at that, but Draco snatched her hand and she halted. Slowly, she looked back at him as he interlocked their fingers and brought the back of her hand up to his mouth. He pressed a soft kiss into her skin.

"I miss you," he whispered.

Closing her eyes and taking another breath, Hermione said, "I can't -"

"I'm not asking you for anything," Draco said. "I'm not asking for any promises or for you to change your plans with... Weasley... I only want to know if I'm the only one that can't get rid of the part of me that aches for you."

Letting out her breath, Hermione whispered, "I miss you too, Draco. But what kind of life would I be living if I gave into the part of me that aches for you? You'd probably buy me an apartment - something close by where we could steal and hour or two when Astoria thinks you're working. Never able to progress from that. And if I got pregnant, I would have a child that could never have any rights to your name or your family's acceptance. We'd be the secret Other Life that you went to when the burdens of being a Malfoy is just too much. That isn't happiness. That's a living hell."

Draco saw it all. Balancing two families - one living comfortably while the other lived in shadows. One cold marriage while he and the love of his life grew resentful of each other as the years went on. Two children - one that got to spend Christmas morning with Daddy while the other barely knew what Daddy looked like anymore.

Hermione was right. That was no way to live.

Placing one last kiss on her hand, and pressing the back of it to his cheek for only one moment - a last moment to commit the smoothness of her flesh to memory - before separating their fingers and palms and walking away. They'd said their goodbyes a hundred times - no need to prolong their parting any longer. It'd already been years.

...~oOo~...

The Hogwarts Express whistle blew, just like Draco always remembered it. Loud and shrill, it echoed about the platform as students said their last farewells and dragged their trunks onto the train.

Astoria Mafloy was embracing their son for the dozenth time while Draco waited on her right for a chance to say goodbye himself. Knowing Astoria, though, he would never get the chance. His wife smothered their son shamelessly, which Draco believed would do nothing but soften and weaken the boy - he himself knew the dangers of having an overbearing mother. Narcissa kept that umbilical chord firmly intact for far too long.

Across the platform, Draco saw her. Hermione Weasley, now, standing with her portly husband. But she hadn't aged a day. Still rosy-cheeked, frizzy-haired, and breathtakingly beautiful, Hermione embraced a young girl who looked his son's age, and had the trademark Weasley red hair. But apart from the coloring, the girl looked just like her mother - all crazy curls, perky nose, and splattered freckles. There was a boy there too, too young for Hogwarts, clinging to his father's pant leg.

Once Astoria finally let go, Draco crouched to the ground beside Scorpius and smiled, turning his son slightly towards Hermione and Ron Weasley.

"Do you know who they are?" Draco asked, pointing conspicuously at the ginger-haired family of four.

Scorpius examined them. "Red hair... hand-me-down trunks... and an ugle knezel familiar. They're Weasleys." He raised an eyebrow at his father, silently asking what he was getting at. "Grandfather doesn't like them."

"Very right. And do you see that young girl? Hugging her mother?"

"Yes..."

Draco bent over and whispered in his son's ear for a long minute while Astoria fretted about their son "missing the train" or some nonsense. Once Draco pulled away, Scorpius looked very confused, but nodded and said, "Yes, Father."

Giving his boy a quick hug - trying to avoid being as suffocating as his wife - Draco then sent Scorpius on his way to his first year of school, hoping that he enjoyed as many adventures as Hogwarts had to offer... And maybe Scorpius would bully and harass and quirky-looking girl who had a deep love for books. And maybe someday that same girl would steal his heart.

...~oOo~...

"Maybe we should have had more pink roses... Oh, I'm no good at this, Ron! Where's Molly?"

"Calm down, love," Ron said, rubbing his wife's back calmly. "Take a deep breath. Everything will be okay."

"This is the most important day of our daughter's life," Hermione said firmly. "It will be more than okay, or so help me..."

"Look at it this way," Ron said brightly. "With any luck, they'll divorce and we can do this all over again."

"Ronald!" Hermione whacked her husband on the arm. "I can't believe you could say such a thing! On Rose's wedding day, of all days!"

Chuckling, Ron said, "I didn't mean it, 'Mione. They're hopelessly in love, anyone can see it. Mad for each other. I mean, I'm not totally thrilled about it, but as long as he makes her happy and keeps her safe, then I know they'll be okay. It kind of makes you think..."

"About what?" Hermione asked.

"About our wedding day," Ron said slowly, his brow furrowed. "You and I were both so calm. No nerves at all. Yet, right now, Rose is up in her room freaking the bloody fuck out and the groom is pacing a hole into the ground."

Hermione raised an eyebrow. "Your point?"

"Just... why weren't we like them?"

"We were just different," Hermione said with a shrug. "Rose and Scorpius are... mad, like you said. Passionate. You and I were best friends. We'd been basically married since Fourth Year, anyway," she teased, elbowing him lightly.

"Should we have been like that, though? Passionate and exciting?"

Hermione gave Ron a slow smile. "We aren't them, Ron. All relationships, marriages, have different kinds of loves - it doesn't make one more powerful than the other. Now, I better go find the florist and see if he has any more pink roses. I love you." She planted a kiss of his cheek and began her hunt for their flower person.

Hermione had scoured half of the Burrow's property, running through the anxious wedding party members, when she almost literally ran into a chest. The chest of a man. A blonde man.

"Oh, goodness... Draco," Hermione said, a little shell-shocked, her throat going dry. "I haven't seen you all day."

"Astoria gets a little crazy at weddings," Draco said. "I've been hiding."

"Really? I haven't seen her."

"She's been looking for the florist."

"What a coincidence, so am I," Hermione said. "I'm sorry about... you know... running into you."

"No worries," Draco said with a soft smile, his silvery eyes glinting in the spring sunlight. "You look beautiful."

Despite herself, Hermione blushed like she was back in Sixth Year again, the first moment that she'd realized that Draco noticed her. It had been right before curfew on a weekend and he'd simply said, "Your hair looks nice up, Granger." And that was the beginning of their very secret relationship, strangely enough.

And they'd come full circle, though Hermione knew she'd only have this flashback for a moment.

"Thank you," Hermione said, her hands sliding down the slim skirt of her lavender dress self-consciously.

"Your daughter looks amazing as well," he said. "Astoria and I went up to give her a hairpin of Astoria's mother's. Something old and blue. She looks extraordinarily like you."

"Really? I've always thought she took after Ron -"

"The hair and eyes, maybe, but the chin, nose, and cheeks are all you," Draco told Hermione.

"Oh..." Hermione wasn't sure what to say to that. "Um, and well, I'm sure you don't need me to tell you how identical Scorpius is to you. It's like looking at a photo of you at school."

Draco smirked. "Lucky boy."

And Hermione snorted. She could help it. She delicately cleared her throat and then said, "Some things never change. You'll always be the same old insufferable Draco Malfoy."

"And you'll always be... the know-it-all Hermione Granger." It hadn't been what he was going to say - they both knew it - but Hermione didn't have the heart to ask. It's not as if he'd tell the truth, anyway.

"I'll be going now," Hermione said, a touch awkwardly. "Flowers to find and a daughter to calm down. Almost time for the ceremony. After all, our kids are getting married. Everything has to be perfect."

"Goodbye, Hermione." _I miss you. _

"Goodbye, Draco." _Sometimes... I miss you too. _

THE END

...~oOo~...

~ So Long And Thanks For All The Fish ~


End file.
